Prime Minister Scott Morrison considers plan to kick extremists out of Australia

Prime Minister Scott Morrison is considering a plan to find Aussies engaging in extremist behaviour and permanently kick them out of the country.

The government is considering a plan to cancel the citizenship of Aussies identified as serious terror threats, or if they’ve been flagged for extremism.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison is debating the idea, which would see potential terror threats, with heritage from a foreign country, stripped of their Australian citizenship.

According to The Daily Telegraph, the plan would only apply to Aussies who have parents or grandparents from different countries thus allowing them to obtain citizenship somewhere else.

Chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Migration Jason Wood also called for residents, who were born overseas, but later became Australian citizens, to be immediately deported if they engaged in extremism.

“As far as I’m concerned, if you’ve put your hand up to say you uphold the rights and responsibility of Australian citizenship, but the next minute you want to talk jihad all day, it’s a breach of contract and you need to go,” Mr Wood said.

The government also struggles with a law that restricts intelligence agencies from deporting dual citizens unless they’ve been convicted of a terrorism offence, he said.

The plan comes the same week three Melbourne men — brothers Ertunc Eriklioglu, 30 and Samed Eriklioglu, 26 and Hanifi Halis, 21 — were charged with allegedly planning a deadly terror attack on Melbourne.

Victoria Police later confirmed the men had all had their Australian passports cancelled this year and were of Turkish background.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison is considering the plan. Picture: Brendan Esposito

Yesterday, Australia’s top Muslim leaders announced they would be boycotting a proposed roundtable with Mr Morrison that was going to give them an opportunity to discuss extremism in Australia.

The group of leaders, including Grand Mufti Ibrahim Abu Mohamed and the presidents of the Islamic councils of Victoria and Queensland, signed a letter last night explaining to the prime minister why they would not attend the meeting.

Melbourne was already on high alert after Somali-born Hassan Khalif Shire Ali terrorised Bourke St on November 9, setting his car on fire and stabbing three innocent bystanders.

Immediately after the Bourke Street attack, the prime minister criticised the Muslim community, claiming it was “making excuses” for extremism.

The group of Muslim leaders slammed the PM’s suggestion the entire community was culpable.

“Many in the Muslim community ... are deeply concerned and disappointed with statements made by senior government ministers and the prime minister in the recent past which infer that the community is collectively culpable for the criminal actions of individuals,” the letter said.

“These statements have achieved nothing to address underlying issues, but rather, have alienated large segments of the Muslim community.”

Mr Morrison addressed the boycott yesterday, saying the leaders were “continuing down a path of denial”.

“Extremist radical Islam is a serious problem ...We all have responsibilities to make Australia safe,” he said.

Mr Morrison first commented on religious extremism when visiting Pellegrini’s cafe in Melbourne, where beloved owner Sisto Malaspina was stabbed to death by Ali.

The PM called for imams and other members of the Muslim community to be better at identifying radicalised people in their congregations and alerting the authorities.

“I won’t cop the excuses,” he said.

“For those who want to stick their head in the sand, for those who want to make excuses for those who stick their head in the sand, you are not making Australia safer. You are giving people an excuse to look the other way and not deal with things right in front of you.

“If there are people in a religious community, an Islamic community, that are bringing in hateful, violent, extremist ideologies into your community, you’ve got to call it out.”